14 Buddhavaṃsa Pāḷi - History of the Buddhas

Buddhavaṃsa Pāḷi gives a short historical account of Gotama Buddha and of the twenty-four Buddhas who had prophesied his attainment of Buddhahood. It consists of twenty-nine sections in verse.

The first section gives an account of how the Venerable Sāriputta asks the Buddha when it was that he first resolved to work for the attainment of Buddhahood and what pāramīs (virtues towards perfection) he had fulfilled to achieve his goal of perfect enlightenment. In the second section, the Buddha describes how as Sumedha the hermit, being inspired by Dīpaṅkara Buddha, he makes the resolution to become a Buddha, and how the Buddha Dīpaṅkara gives the hermit Sumedha his blessing prophesying that Sumedha would become a Buddha by the name of Gotama after a lapse of four asaṅkheyyas and a hundred thousand kappas (world cycles).

From then onwards, the bodhisatta Sumedha keeps on practising the ten pāramīs namely: alms-giving, morality, renunciation, wisdom, perseverance, tolerance, truthfulness, determination, loving-kindness and equanimity. Buddha relates how he fulfills these pāramīs, existence after existence, and how each of the twenty-four Buddhas, who appeared after Dīpaṅkara Buddha at different intervals of world cycles, renewed the prophesy that he would become a Buddha by the name of Gotama.

In sections three to twenty-seven are accounts of the twenty-five Buddhas including Gotama Buddha, giving details about each of them with regard to birth, status, names of their parents, names of their wives and children, their life-span, their way of renunciation, duration of their efforts to Buddhahood, their teaching of the Dhammacakka Sutta in the Migadāyavana, the names of their chief disciples and their chief lay disciples. Each section is closed with an account of where the Buddhas pass away and how their relics are distributed.

In the twenty-eighth section is given the names of three Buddhas, namely Taṇhaṅkara, Medhaṅkara and Saraṇaṅkara who lived before Dīpaṅkara Buddha at different intervals of the same world cycle. The names of other Buddhas (up to Gotama Buddha) are also enumerated together with the name of the kappas in which they have appeared. Finally there is a prophesy by the Buddha that Metteyya Buddha would arise after him in this world.

The last section gives an account of how the Buddha’s relics are distributed and where they are preserved.